Well well well, look at the time. It’s September already, and you know what that means, right? That’s right, it’s time for the 2019 NFL season to kick off! As such, the inaugural post for this column will kick off as well (yes, I know I wrote something last month but that was mainly to pad my post count for the month). The Packers are looking primed to go places in 2019, and I hope that I’m right in thinking we might have a higher end offense and defense. The team simply looks better all around, along with having a decent schedule that leads me to believe we can make the playoffs for the first time in a couple of years. The season starts with the Packers facing the Bears at Solider Field — a fitting beginning to the 100th NFL season with two teams around the same age. I am definitely looking forward to this game and am hoping that many of my questions about the team will be answered. With that said, a little refresher on what to expect from this column in the coming months:

• I make my picks for winners and losers of each individual game week by week. I also take a stab at the game’s final score.
• I score myself each week in a recap before making picks for the upcoming week.
• Come playoff time, I make picks on the games prior to that weekend. This all culminates in my pick for the winner of the Superbowl.
• After the season is over, I do a big summary post where I tally up my correct and incorrect picks, scoring correct ones with a point and getting bonus points for correct scores (which rarely happens).

So far I have improved year over year during the time I’ve been doing this column in this format. I did start it several years ago and used to only provide some commentary on games, and then made picks but didn’t keep score. Things are more interesting this way, even if it is just a competition against myself. So now you’ll know what to expect from By The Numbers — if you aren’t a football fan, you’ll probably want to skip these. Let’s get on with my picks for week 1:

Packers 35, Bears 27
Rams 24, Panthers 20
Redskins 21, Eagles 17
Bills 20, Jets 10
Vikings 27, Falcons 21
Ravens 30, Dolphins 7
Chiefs 35, Jags 21
Browns 17, Titans 10
Chargers 20, Colts 13
Seahawks 23, Bengals 14
49ers 21, Buccs 20
Cowboys 21, Giants 9
Lions 20, Cardinals 16
Steelers 28, Patriots 26
Saints 31, Texans 17
Broncos 24, Raiders 13

I’ll see you guys next week, and we’ll see how I did. Until then, happy footballin’.